The year in new media: from Facebook’s IPO to viral activism to Olympic gold

In 2012 we’ve seen significant shifts in the social media landscape while also watching some of the year’s biggest events unfold on these networks. We take a look back on the year in new media, taking in Facebook’s many milestones, the viral sensations that took over our feeds, and the sporting contests that dominated the internet this summer.

The real star of the IPO show for us, though, was Irish Facebook engineer Colm Doyle, who helped devise the clever hack that saw Zuckerberg’s timeline automatically update the second he rang the NASDAQ bell.

The world’s biggest social network will undoubtedly continue to make the headlines in 2013, and a format change mistaken for a privacy bug showed us all just how much the social network has changed in its few years of existence.

Heroes and villains

Elsewhere in social media, Twitter kicked off a turf war with the rollout of its new API rules, which recently resulted in fractured relations between the microblogging service and Instagram – and it’s the users that have had to suffer.

This photo of Barack Obama and wife Michelle, taken following the confirmation of his re-election, not only became themost ‘liked’ photo inFacebook’s history, but is also the most retweeted tweet of 2012, attracting more than 810,000 retweets and more than 300,000 favourites

The Kony 2012 debate

Viral sensations powered into the mainstream this year and, in March, filmmaker Jason Russell’s viral campaign to arrest Ugandan guerrilla leader Joseph Kony before the end of the year took the internet by storm, sparking much online debate about both the campaign’s and Russell’s own credibility.

Sporting achievements

One thing we learned in 2012 is the power of sport in new media, and two key events in the sporting calendar – the UEFA Euro 2012 tournament and the Olympic Games – took over social networks for the summer.

First up was Euro 2012 in Poland and Ukraine. The Republic of Ireland squad had qualified for the first time since 1988, long before the days of social media, and the rocky road to Poznan was documented with enthusiasm on Twitter and other networks.

At the time, Ireland was ranked third in the world for Euro 2012-related searches online as we fervently sought information on the tournament and how to get there, as well as seeking flags and bunting to decorate our homes.

But all the tweets, searches, decorations, and even a rousing sing-song from a class of Thai schoolkids weren’t enough and Ireland was knocked out at the group stages. Ireland could have been worse off, though. Belgian football fans didn’t even have a team to cheer for in the tournament and so put their support up for auction on eBay, raising more than €3,000 for Unicef.

And though we were there only for a brief time, we certainly left our mark on the Polish people.

It wasn’t all fun and games on social media throughout the tournament, however, and the event brought out some users’ dark side. Twitter users filed police complaints against @Lapwnage, who tweeted racist remarks at England’s Ashley Cole and Ashley Young following the team’s quarter final defeat. The user was threatened with a public order offence for the hateful comments and has since deleted his account.

Olympic gold

‘Euro 2012’ turned out to be the most Googled-for term in Ireland throughout all of 2012, and second in line was Olympic gold medallist, ‘Katie Taylor’.

Overall though, the London 2012 Olympic Games were a collective online celebration. And, of course, such a massive and well-documented worldwide event couldn’t pass without spawning a few memes. Our favourites? Bronze goes to the Olympic divers on toilets, silver to the disgruntled Queen, while the gold goes home with Kurt Roberts’ shot put face.